Multi-compartment roll file



y 1967 B. FITERMAN ETAL 3,321,259

MULTI-GOMPARTMENT ROLL FILE INVENTORS BENJAMIN rnzzmy, BY lz'oyAzoMPAzz'rz Filed Aug. 9, 1965 I'll United States Patent 3,321,259 MULTl-COMPARTMENT ROLL FILE Benjamin Fiterman and Leonard M. Paletz, both of Minneapolis, Minn., assignors to Fidelity File Box, Inc., a

corporation of Minnesota Filed Aug. 9, 1965, Ser. No. 478,110 4 Claims. (Cl. 312259) This invention relates to an improvement in roll files and particularly relates to a stackable multi-compartment roll file having a door and constructed from corrugated paper.

Architects, engineers and land surveyors as well as many other technically trained professional people require a means for storing such diverse items as large blue prints, drawings, maps and ledger sheets.

Wholesalers and retailers of the large rolls of paper from which blue prints, drawings, maps and ledger sheets are made must store these items prior to sale. After the item has been purchased by a potential user the rolls must be stored until they are needed.

Such items as gift wrapping paper are also made in roll form. Because of the low cost and multiplicity of patterns of gift wrapping paper, it is desirable for a gift wrapping department in a retail store to keep this paper in a container which has several compartments. The container for this purpose must be one in which there is no need to invest a large amount of capital to protect the item to be sold or to make it easier to show the item to be sold.

It has been found that for storage of the above mentioned rolls a multi-compartment roll file is very satisfactory. The rolls are very easily removed from the compartments and there is not the necessity for folding which must be done when using conventional filing cabinets.

For the storage of finished blue prints, drawings or maps in rolls it is desirable to have any indexing means to determine which compartment a given print or prints are located in. It is also desirable to remove an entire filled compartment and replace it with an empty compartment thereby obviating the removal of, for example, finished blue prints, drawings or maps from the compartment. An efficient roll file should also have a means for changing the index when a compartment registered on the index has been removed and replaced with another compartment.

To properly protect finished blue prints, drawings, maps and other such items from deterioration, dust and other damage, it is an advantage to have a dooror covering over the part of the container which exposes the rolls placed within the compartments.

A multi-compartment roll file must'be strong enough so that when additional containers are added to the system these additional containers can be stacked on 'each other, consideration being given for thecontainer which has been filled with various finished or unfinished rolls of paper.

An object of our invention is to provide a new and improved multi-cornpartment roll file of simple and inexpensive construction.

It is an object of our invention to provide a multicompart-mentroll file which, although low in cost and fabricated from corrugated material, is strong enough to support several other multi-compartment roll files which have been filled with material filed within the various compartments.

Another object of our invention is to provide a roll file with an opening disposed endwise of the container so that the file may be removed with a minimum of effort.

A feature of our invention is a door to cover and protect the opening through which the rolls are filed within the multi-compartment container may be retrieved. The door, of course, must have a latch assembly to secure the door when not in use.

Another feature of our invention is the provision for a moisture resistant plastic coating to additionally protect the material stored within the roll file.

A further feature of our invention is the provision for an additional wall liner to give added strength to the container and greater protection to the material filed within the container.

These and other objects and features of our invention will be more fully understood in the following description made in connection with the accompanying drawings wherein like reference characters refer to the same or similar parts throughout the several views, and in which:

FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the roll file showing the door open, the rolls exposed, the indexing chart, and the construction of the corrugated material.

FIG. 2 is an end view of the roll file showing the door closed.

FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view of the roll file with the compartments removed, the section taken along the section lines 3-3 of FIG. 1.

FIG. 4 is a partial cross-section view of the latch assembly the view taken along the section line 4-4 of FIG. 2.

FIG. 5 is a perspective view showing the detail of the door prior to assembly.

FIG. 6 is a perspective view showing an exploded portion of the multi-compartment container and door assembly prior to assembling the door into the container.

FIG. 7 is a plan view of the blank from which the container is made.

FIG. 8 is a plan view of the blank from which the liner is made.

The container of our invention is best described by referring to FIG. 7, the plan view of the blank from which the container is made. The container comprises a blank 10 having a bottom wall 11, side wall 12, top wall 13, and side wall 14 hingedly connected in series along parallel fold lines 15, 16, and 17 respectively. A glue flap 18 is hingedly connected to side wall 14 along fold line 19. End fiap 20 is hingedly connected to bottom wall 11 along fold line 21. Sidefiap 22 is hingedly connected to side wall 12 along fold line 23, an extension of fold line 21. End flap 24 is hingedly connected to top wall 13 along fold line 25 which is an extension of fold line 21. Side flap 26 is hingedly connected to side wall 14 along fold line 27 which is an extension of fold line 21.

Bottom ring retaining fiap 28 is hingedly connected to bottom wall 11 along closely spaced parallel fold lines 29 and 30. Side ring retaining flap 31 having a latchreceiving slot 32 therein is hingedly connected to side wall 12 along closely spaced parallel fold lines 33 and 34 which lines are extensions of fold lines 29 and 30. Top ring retaining flap 35.is hingedly connected to top wall 13 along closely spaced parallel lines 36 and 37 which are extensions of fold lines 29 and 30. Side ring retaining flap 38 is hingedly connected to side wall 14 along closely spaced parallel fold lines 39 and 40 which are extensions of fold lines 29 and 30.

A liner blank is shown in FIG. 8 and comprises a side liner wall 41 having a latch bracket receiving notch 42, a top liner wall 43, a side liner wall 44 and a bottom liner wall 45 hingedly connected in series along parallel fold lines 46, 47 and 48 respectively.

The construction of the door is best shown in FIG. 5, the perspective view of the door prior to assembly. The door is made from a blank 50 and comprises an inside door panel 51 and an outside door panel 52 hingedly J connected along fold line 53. Reinforcing panels 54, 55 and 56 are hingedly connected to outside door panel 52 along fold lines 57, 58 and 60 respectively. A reinforcing ring 61 having legs 61a, 61b, 61c and 61d is shown in the door assembly with a leg 61a of the reinforcing ring 61 parallel and adjacent to fold line 53 sandwiched between inside door panel 51 and outside door panel 52.

The structure of the locking assembly is best shown in FIG. 4, a partial view of the latch assembly in crosssection, the section taken along the section line 44 of FIG. 2. Side liner wall 41 is shown sandwiched between side wall 12 and side ring retaining flap 31. The reinforcing ring 61 is shown in cross section attached to latch bracket 62. A magnet 63 is shown connected to the bracket 62. A plate 64 which is sensitive to the magnet is shown secured to the door assembly. Knob 65 is shown secured with screw and lock washer assembly 66 and 67 respectively. Inside door panel 51, door reinforcing flap 55 and front door panel 52 are also shown.

FIG. 2 is a front elevation view of the door assembly showing the front door panel 52 with a label receiving frame 68. Also shown is the knob 65 and the magnet sensitive plate 64.

Referring to FIG. 1, the view showing a perspective of the container in assembled form with tubes located therein to form compartments, the container blank 10 is folded into a container having a generally cross-sectional rectangular configuration. Glue flap 18 is secured to bottom wall 11 which overlaps glue flap 18. The joint at which bottom wall 11 is connected to side wall 14 is commonly referred to in the trade as the manufacturers joint and may be done in any of several accepted ways.

As shown in FIG. 3, a cross-section of the container of FIG. 1 taken along the section line 3-3 of FIG. 1, bottom flap and top flap 24 are folded inwardly into edge abutting and substantially co-planar relation. Side flaps 22 and 26 are then folded inwardly into edge abutting and co-planar relation and into face contact with and secured to top and bottom flaps 20 and 24 respectively.

The liner shown in FIG. 8 is then folded into a substantially rectangular cross-section and inserted in the container described above. Side liner wall 41 is superimposed on the inside surface of side panel 12. Top liner wall 43 is superimposed on the inside of top panel 13, as is side liner wall 44 with side panel 14 and bottom liner wall 45 with bottom wall 11.

The door assembly, shown in FIG. 6 is next assembled to the container. Ring retaining flap 38, shown in FIG. 6, is folded inwardly 180 degrees along closely spaced parallel fold lines 39 and 40 into face contact with liner walls 44. The magnet 63 and latch bracket 62 are then assembled in the receiving slot 32 in side wall 12. Notch 42 inside liner Wall 41 allows for the space taken by the magnet and latch bracket assembly. Reinforcing ring retaining flap 28 is folded upwardly along closely spaced parallel fold lines 29, 30 over reinforcing ring 61 and into face contact with liner wall 45 thereby sandwiching reinforcing ring leg 61b between bottom wall 11 and retaining flap 28 and adjacent to fold lines 29 and 30. Ring retaining flaps 31 and 35 are folded inwardly, as above, thereby securing the reinforcing ring legs 61c and 61d within the container. Tubes 69, as shown in FIG. 1, may now be inserted in the container. The tubes 69 force the ring retaining flaps 28, 31, 35 and 38 against the liner walls 45, 41, 43 and 44 respectively. This obviates the necessity for gluing or stapling the ring retaining flaps to the liner. The index chart 70 on the inner door panel 51 corresponds to the tube locations in the corrugated container.

In FIG. 1 the construction of the corrugated material from which the container is made is shown in the breakaway sketch. The corrugated material comprises an inner liner 71 and an outer liner 72 with a corrugated medium 73 sandwiched therebetween. The corrugated medium comprises several flutes which in the instance of the container of our invention, are disposed parallel to the direction of the tubes 69.

The stacking strength of a corrugated container is obtained from a disposition of the flutes in line with the downward force of a stacked container. As can be seen from FIG. 1, the force from a multi-compartment roll file stacked on the roll file of FIG. 1 would exert a force normal to the flutes of the corrugated material and would therefore receive no substantial support from the corrugated material. Since it is of utmost importance in the manufacture of a corrugated container to minimize costs, we found it necessary to make the blank as shown in FIG. 7 with the corrugated flutes disposed normal to the side flap fold lines 29 and 30 as shown in breakaway C of FIG. 7. In the multi-compartment roll file of our invention we found that the stacking support supplied by the top, bottom and side flaps 24, 20, 22 and 26, respectively, folded and secured in position, along with the support obtained from the reinforcing ring 61 certainly gave an amount of stacking strength to our multi-compartment roll file. However, additional stacking strength was necessary. We found that by inserting paper tubes in the roll file we added sufficient stacking strength to the container so that several additional containers could be supported by the container of our invention utilizing the proper number of tubes.

From the foregoing it will be appreciated that the multicompartment roll file of our invention may assume different forms and may be made of various materials. It will be understood that these and other various changes may be made in the form, detail, arrangement and proportions of the various parts without departing from the scope of our invention.

What is claimed is:

1. A multi-compartment roll file comprising:

a container having opposed, parallel top and bottom walls and opposed, parallel side walls of predetermined length and width hingedly connected in series and having a rectangular cross-section, said container having a rearward and a forward end,

an end closure assembly attached to the rearward end of said container,

a reinforcing ring having a rectangular cross-section of the same configuration as the crosssection of said container,

ring retaining flaps hingedly connected to the forward end of said container along the top, bottom and side walls, said flaps folded inwardly degrees around three sides of said reinforcing ring and secured to the top, bottom and side walls of said container thereby securing said ring to said container whereby said container walls are maintained in right angular relation, and providing a hinge formed by the exposed side of said reinforcing ring along the other side wall of said container.

a door hingedly connected at the forward end of said container including an inner and outer panel hingedly connected and sandwiching a portion of said reinforcing ring therebetween, and including a latch assembly whereby said door may be secured to said container in closed position, and

a plurality of tubes of predetermined length and diameter disposed longitudinally of said container and substantially filling the cross-section of said container, certain of said tubes having portions of their exterior surfaces in tangential face contact with other of said tubes and with the walls of said container, thereby imparting structural strength to said container whereby a plurality of containers can be placed one upon another.

2. The structure of claim 1 including a liner having top, bottom and side wall panels hingedly connected in series and nested within said container.

3. In a container having opposed, parallel top and bottom walls and opposed, parallel side walls of predetermined length and Width hingedly connected in series and having a rectangular cross-section, and having a reinforcing ring of rectangular cross-section substantially the same as the cross-section of said container said reinforcing ring aflixed to said container, the improvement which comprises: a door having inner and outer panels hingedly connected and folded around said reinforcing ring along one side thereof and secured in face contact whereby said door is hingedly connected along said reinforcing ring, said door having means securing said door to said container in closed position.

4. In a rectangular, tubular container having a reinforcing ring aflixed to said container at an opening thereof maintaining said container in rectangular configuration, the improvement which comprises: a door having hingedly connected inner and outer panels including reinforcing flaps hingedly connected to one of said panels along predetermined edges thereof and folded inwardly into face References Cited by the Examiner UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,061,485 11/1936 Scheinman 312-259 X 2,268,236 12/1941 Baird 312-111 X 2,785,940 3/1957 Felton 312-111 X 2,904,382 9/1959 Mitten 312259 X 3,011,852 12/1961 Mahan 312351 OHANCELLOR E. HARRIS, Primary Examiner. F. DOMOTOR, Assistant Examiner. 

3. IN A CONTAINER HAVING OPPOSED, PARALLEL TOP AND BOTTOM WALLS AND OPPOSED, PARALLEL SIDE WALLS OF PREDETERMINED LENGTH AND WIDTH HINGEDLY CONNECTED IN SERIES AND HAVING A RECTANGULAR CROSS-SECTION, AND HAVING A REINFORCING RING OF RECTANGULAR CROSS-SECTION SUBSTANTIALLY THE SAME AS THE CROSS-SECTION OF SAID CONTAINER SAID REINFORCING RING AFFIXED TO SAID CONTAINER, THE IMPROVEMENT WHICH COMPRISES: A DOOR HAVING INNER AND OUTER PANELS HINGEDLY 